Friday, May 8, 2020

Governor Cuomo badly reimagines education

Back in 2016, I had the honor of being commencement
speaker for my alma mater, Royalton-Hartland. My speech was mostly on point,
celebrating our school and community and the great students that came from them.

But, I’m a newspaper columnist, I peddle opinions.
So, I briefly went off message and threw a shot at Common Core, the monster of
scholastic control that was forced upon educators by non-educators.

I’ll never forget the cheers and vast sea of fist
pumps, nodding heads and smiles when I said, “Common Core is rotten to the core.”
That universal acknowledgement by the crowd of hundreds spoke to the
frustration that teachers, parents and students harbor towards mandates in the
classroom.

It didn’t begin and it certainly won’t end with
Common Core. The laundry list of educational failures from higher bodies is
endless. Think “No Child Left Behind” and “Regents Exams”.

Such programs haven’t worked and will never work as
well as powerbrokers would hope because the people who best know the subjects
and students (the teachers), have their finger on the pulse of the community
(the administrators and school boards), and understand what’s best for their
kids (the parents) are all left out of the equation. Under the rules from
above, they must do as they are told and cannot do as they should. Elected
officials and powerful agencies in the state capitol and Washington, DC, -- and
profiteers on Wall Street -- dictate what must be taught and how it should be
taught. Education has been standardized by individuals who truly don’t know how
to work with children.

That tragic situation is about to get worse in New
York if Governor Cuomo has his way.

The Governor’s daily Covid-19 press conferences are
a study in political foreplay. He attempts to warm you up to ideas gradually.
It’s like reading the tea leaves – he’ll throw some hints your way then days
later he hits you with what he wanted to say all along.

In recent weeks, he was repeatedly fond of saying
that the distance learning that has been an outcome of New York’s shutdown has
been great. I kept wondering why he would say that. It was the furthest thing
from the truth. I don't know a single teacher, parent,
or student who believes that remote learning has been a winner. It’s been
frustrating and heartbreaking for everyone. Sure, we’re all trying, and we all
have to under the circumstances, but nothing beats the classroom and the
magical abilities of our teachers in the presence of children.

So, why did he keep
championing distance learning?

It was his attempt to make
an easy sell out of last week’s announcement – a sale that blew up in his face,
by the way, when you gauge the responses by New York’s teachers, principals and
superintendents on social media – that the state will be working with the Gates
Foundation to “re-imagine” education in the Empire State with a focus on
non-classroom learning.

It just so happens the Gates
Foundation was the driving force behind Common Core.

We don’t need Common Core
2.0. The first version is bad enough. An impersonal one would be worse.

But, that’s what Cuomo is
trying to sell us.

Re-imagining wouldn’t be a
bandage to cover the wounds of Covid-19 temporarily as our nation heals.
Instead, it would be the scar that’s left once the bandage is removed.

There was an air of
permanency in Cuomo’s slideshow and talking points and, given Gates’ investment,
you’d expect as much. As Cuomo said, "…the old model of our
education system where everyone sits in a classroom is not going to work in the
new normal. When we do reopen our schools let's reimagine them for the future.”

The future.

This is, undoubtedly, one of
those “never let a good crisis go to waste” moments that politicians crave. Cuomo
said as much with less controversial phrasing: "We have a moment in
history where we can incorporate and advance ideas. I think this is one of
those moments. Let's think about revolutionizing education."

A revolution.

As would be expected from
someone totally removed from education, the Governor’s revolution is all about
technology and using it to replace, not necessarily augment, the classroom
experience.

Nary was a mention given to
people.

I don’t care if you have a
high-tech classroom or a factory with the very best machinery: Your greatest
assets are your people. The folks in the trenches are what get the job done.

The state and federal
government have lost sight of that through the years. They think they,
statistics and computers – not teachers -- are better suited for managing how
our kids learn, what they should learn, and what they can become.

We have to stop that immediately.
We can’t go further down this path. We have to make sure Cuomo doesn’t open the
gates to the Gates again.

You want to re-imagine education?

Let’s imagine it the way it
used to be, when the loving souls who actually know education were allowed to
educate.

If we go back to that then
we are guaranteed success for our schools, students and society.

From the 11 May 2020 Greater Niagara Newspapers and Batavia Daily News